


A Hundred Year War

by emenerd



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Gen, I wrote this a really long time ago, Introspection, Originally Posted on FanFiction.Net, Post Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-02
Updated: 2019-11-02
Packaged: 2021-01-16 20:50:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 741
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21277517
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emenerd/pseuds/emenerd
Summary: A war that lasts a hundred years will always leave a mark on the world. A one-shot ficlet.





	A Hundred Year War

**Author's Note:**

> Just a one-shot I found laying around on my hard-drive. I had totally forgotten about it. This doesn't take LoK or the Promise Trilogy into account.  
Originally posted 09/09/12.

A hundred year war leaves no soul untouched. Everyone has felt it's effects at some point. Some lost family, friends, others lost less tangible things. I knew kids who could have been great people before having their life cut short. I know a girl who can't ask for help because her parents were scared of what would happen if they didn't smother their disabled daughter. I know a guy who spent so long being blamed for everything by his father, that he carries guilt for things that he had absolutely no control of; trying to make up for betraying his insane family, who any sensible person would say betrayed him first. I know a twelve year old who was forced to clean up a one hundred year old mess created by adults.

My sister is terrified that she might lose one of us to rebels if we're out of her sight. She's been scared since our mother was murdered, but she covers it so well that most people can't tell. Me, I'm just your average guy who had to grow up too fast. Before I got involved in the whole world mess, I was happy. I was happy to stay at home and make sure my people were taken care of. I've killed now. I'm almost sixteen, and I've ended the life of another human being. I can't go back home yet. I can't go back to living as though none of it happened.

I've been studying the origins of the now ended war. About all I can figure out, is that it was no one person who caused it. A lot of people blame Sozin who fired the first shot, others blame the last Avatar, Roku for not killing Sozin when he had a chance. A few blame Aang, the twelve year old Avatar, for running away and getting stuck in an iceberg. A couple of historians have even been blaming the monks who told Aang that he was the Avatar so early, and, if they had to tell him, not telling him the whole story.

I tried finding someone to blame, but nobody could be responsible for this mess all on their own, and now I've realised that I don't care who's fault it is. Knowing who to blame won't bring my mother back. It won't let me know what Toph would be like if she had been allowed to live before leaving home. It won't tell me what Zuko would be like if he hadn't been verbally abused most of his life by his maniac father. Blaming someone won't turn Aang back into his cheerful self and stop his world-weary sighs. Knowing whose fault it is won't make my sister into the care-free child she should still be. It won't let me see Yue again. It doesn't help anyone to blame. We have to accept and move on.

Toph has started an Earthbending academy, and a part of it will take in children who need a new home. It's funded by the newly crowned Firelord Zuko, who's finally realised that he has friends who don't just see what his family has done, and actually care him. Aang is continuing his nomadic journey to see the entire world, and help people recover from the war, searching for Airbenders on the side. Katara is traveling with him, and they seem happy together.

We're all finding our places in the world. I'm helping the Mechanist design an entire new world. Well, we're working on one city right now, Aang and Zuko thought it was the best thing to do with the old colonies. It's to be called Republic City, and it will belong to all the nations.

Hopefully together we'll keep anyone else from being like us. If we do it right, a group of teenagers, the oldest barely sixteen, won't ever need to save the world again. Hopefully, children will be able to go to people like Toph, and her boyfriend, Teo, for advice on how to live life fully while disabled. Hopefully, people who stubbornly see only what is wrong with their children, some of it caused by the parents action, will not be allowed to abuse them with no one able to interfere. Hopefully, a twelve year old won't be told to duel maniacs to the death. Hopefully no other little girls will watch their mother murdered in their stead.

Hopefully, no one else will have to kill.


End file.
